On April 2, 1978, Tim Cullen dreamed that he was in a terrible car accident. Just 7 days later, on April 9, he and his friend Ken Ruberg, were driving on Highway 34 when Tim realized what he was experiencing, was indeed his recent dream.
Seconds later, he rolled the car five times, breaking his neck on the first roll. As the car finally stopped, Ken Ruberg was able to get out of the car and help Cullen up out of the ditch. Eventually Ruberg waved down a passing station wagon, which took Cullen to the nearest hospital. in the hospital, under sedation, Cullen dreamed of an encounter with a UFO.
After the car wreck Tim recalled, “I thought about stopping and going back to town but didn’t”.
He was confused and healing, and in the back of his mind he knew something wasn’t right.
About 6 weeks later, Tim and his wife Janet, a registered nurse, were driving north on Highway 59 near the Vernon Road junction. They were returning home from a medical check-up in Denver. It was a dark quiet night, and shortly after 11:00 pm, Tim saw a large, dimly lit object pass in front of the car, go behind a low hill, and re-emerge.
As Tim recalled, “It went out a way, alongside, and as I brought the car down to a stop, it came back toward us a bit. I backed the car up, and the UFO went out to the west of us. It came in under the power and telephone lines and hovered over a pasture. “It was about a hundred foot long and twenty foot wide, and about ten foot high,”
“It didn’t make any noise. There were two diffused lights that shone at the back of the craft, one a light yellow, and the other red. We couldn’t see very good. We sat there and stared at it for a while. After we looked at the two lights for a few minutes I turned to my wife and told her we might as well go on to town.”
At the time of this sighting, Janet was five months pregnant with their first child. And in what perhaps was foreshadowing of things to come, The Cullens had no memory of being taken aboard the craft, nor of any missing time.
As time passed, their feelings on being abducted would change though.
Tim recalls: “Now, when I think about it, when I turned and started driving, I did have an odd feeling, but it didn’t really register with me. I remember coming back to Yuma, but not looking at a clock. I was kind of shocked by the whole thing. I didn’t really think of looking at a clock,”
Two years later, in 1980, Tim Cullen experienced another encounter, and terrifyingly, at exactly the same spot. The craft hovered and two diffused yellow lights came on. Then one started blinking, and he stared at it. Tim remembers thinking that.
“This can’t be happening. “Not right here!”
The craft kept moving in back of, and out from behind a low hill. Then it moved slowly away from him.
Still, that would ‘t be the family’s last sighting.
in 1994, with his wife and three daughters, they encountered a smaller craft with a strobe light, about forty miles south of Yuma.
“Tim stated “It hovered off the road in front of us, and we stopped and looked at it for five to ten minutes. It moved around for a while and finally went off to the north,” Tim remembers his daughters’ reaction specifically, stating:
“The girls seemed mystified by it, but they were younger, and I don’t really think they realized the enormity of what they were seeing.”
in 1998, while setting rebar at a job, Tim Cullen hit his thumb with a hammer. Sometime later, he thought the finger might be dislocated so he went to see Dr. Mark Hubner at the Yuma Clinic. The doctor suggested they take an X-ray. On returning with the film, Dr. Hubner asked, “Did you know you have a piece of metal in your arm?”
At that moment, Tim Cullen knew what the object was and who put it in. He knew that he and Janet had, indeed, experienced missing time on May 30, 1978.
Tim didn’t think much about UFOs or abduction before his experiences and had never heard about Alien implants. But after seeing the X-ray and knowing where the object in the film came from, he started exploring the Internet about the subject of UFOs and abduction. He joined an on-line encounter group, and learned about a man in California, Dr. Roger K. Leir, who removed what were reported to be “Alien Implants”. He and Leir communicated for over a year.
Over the years he would have multiple surgeries to remove what was believed to be alien implants.
Analysis from seven of the first eight implants removed have shown that there is a membrane surrounding the metal core that seems to keep them protected from foreign object rejection.
These membranes were reddish brown, and had several long, preceptors (which were connected to nerve endings) on one end. When a magnet was placed a half-inch from the objects, they leapt to the magnet.
The ninth alleged alien implant was surgically removed from the left forearm of Tim Cullen on Saturday, February 5, 2000. The operation was performed at a medical facility in Thousand Oaks, California. The procedure was performed by a surgical team led by Dr Roger Leir; the surgery by Dr. John D, Matrisciano.
I know nothing about UFOs or implants,” Dr. Matrisciano said after the operation, “but I think that’s what is needed in this case; to be objective.” Removal of the small, “melon seed” type implant went very quickly, and smoothly. The operation was videotaped by The Learning Channel for an upcoming show.
At a MUFON Board meeting, Tim would see videotape of the object that was removed, which was shot through a microscope. The object was about 7 centimeters long and 4 centimeters wide.
Tim Cullen has become very outspoken about his experiences and about the object that was recently removed from his arm. Unlike others who have had implants removed, Tim has allowed his name to be used in the press and has given out his phone number.
On returning to Yuma after the implant removal, Cullen told his story to Yuma’s local paper, The Yuma Pioneer, and addressed both the congregations of his Catholic Church, and his wife’s Presbyterian Church. He has also been on the Art Bell Dreamland show with Dr. Roger Leir and host Whitley Streiber.
Tim has become an inspiration for people who have been abducted. While at one of the church presentations a woman reached out and touched Tim’s sleeve. “My husband and I know exactly what you’ve been through,” she told him.
Another man emailed Tim and told him of an experience he had had.
“I’m coming forward because someone has to put a face to the alien stories, and cause more people to come forward,” Tim Cullen told the Pioneer. “The more people we can find with implants, the more evidence we’re going to have. We can study things a lot more and get things done; get rid of the stigma around it.”
Cullen stated that: “The events that have happened to me over the past twenty-seven years have had an enormous effect on my life and what I believe. In a short span of time in 1978 it was revealed to me that we are not the only intelligent life in the universe, and it was also proven to me that God is with us always, without a doubt.”
While Tim’s story certainly shares features of other alien abductees, many skeptics point to the fact that he put his name out there and appeared to be seeking attention with the matter. Still, people who know Tim and his family, stress they are regular, honest people. Regardless, Tim has become a hero for many abductees who refuse to come forward with their stories.
